THE POLL BLUDGER
New South Wales Legislative Assembly Election 2007

STRATHFIELD
Labor 15.2%

Strathfield is located about 10 kilometres to the west of the city, and includes the suburbs of Croydon, Burwood and Enfield along with Strathfield itself. The redistribution has extended the electorate southward into Enfield, absorbing 2500 voters from Bankstown and 1300 from Canterbury. Another transfer with Canterbury sees it lose 5000 voters further to the east, at Summer Hill. The electorate was created in 1988 in place of abolished Burwood, which had only been won for Labor since its creation in 1927 with the 1978 and 1981 "Wranslides". Paul Zammit recovered it for the Liberals in 1984 and transferred to Strathfield in 1988, holding it until he entered federal politics in 1996 as the member for Lowe (which he lost to Labor's John Murphy in 1998). Bruce MacCarthy retained the seat for the Liberals at the ensuing by-election, but it fell to Labor after an unfavourable redistribution and an 11.1 per cent swing in 1999.

The new member was Paul Whelan, the Carr government Police Minister who was forced to contest the seat after the abolition of Ashfield, which he had held since 1976. Whelan remained in the portfolio until his retirement in 2003, when Strathfield mayor Virginia Judge (right) retained the seat for Labor with a further 7.4 per cent swing. Judge had won Labor preselection unopposed with the backing of Eddie Obeid, upper house MP and powerbroker for the "Terrigals" sub-faction of the Right. She had earlier sought preselection ahead of the 1995 election, and for the by-election that followed Zammit's resignation. Judge and Obeid have reportedly since fallen out over a branch-stacking war that ended with the state party implementing a 12-month membership freeze in May 2005. Jennifer Sexton of The Australian reported that the trouble began when Obeid sought to assert his influence when it became apparent he no longer had any influence over Judge.

The Liberal candidate at the coming election is another Strathfield mayor, Bill Carney, with whom Judge has frequently crossed swords. In June 2005 Judge denied opposition allegations that she was linked to two other councillors, Alfred Tsang and John Abi-Saab, whom the Independent Commission Against Corruption had recommended face charges; Tsang for accepting bribes, Abi-Saab for attempting to blackmail Tsang. Then-Liberal leader John Brogden told parliament Judge had received donations from several of the scandal's principals, to which Bob Carr responded that she had been "at odds" with them and had campaigned against them.

ASSESSMENT: Labor retain